Normative Legitimacy: Rules of Appropriateness in Citizens’ Assessments of Individual Judicial Decisions

AbstractThis study investigates the interaction between rules of appropriateness, popular support for judicial decisions, and policy preferences in assessments of the legitimacy of court decisions. We conduct two 3 × 2 × 2 experiments examining participants' perceptions of legitimacy in cases involving the tort liability of gun manufacturers (Experiment 1) and same-sex marriage (Experiment 2). By manipulating the explanation for the judge's decision (bribe, political contribution, ideology, and law), we examine how participants assess the legitimacy of motivations suggesting compliance with, and deviations from, rules of appropriate judicial behavior in relation to one another. We also analyze how such rules interact with other factors theorized to influence assessments of legitimacy. Our findings demonstrate that rules of appropriateness matter most in participants' assessments of the legitimacy of court decisions. Moreover, as hypothesized, the influence of other variables is conditioned on compliance with decision-making rules. In Experiment 1, broad public support for decisions enhances legitimacy assessments, but only where the grounds of decision are not viewed as wholly inappropriate. In Experiment 2, involving the salient issue of same-sex marriage, personal preferences influence legitimacy assessments, but again, not where participants view grounds for decision as particularly suspect. KEYWORDS:: legitimacyjudicial decision-makingrules of appropriatenesspublic opinion APPENDIX Table 1 TABLE A1 Demographic Characteristics of Participants (Percentages)Download CSVDisplay Table Table 2 TABLE A2 Main Effects for ANOVA on All Participants in Experiment 1: Gun LiabilityDownload CSVDisplay Table Table 3 TABLE A3 Disaggregated ANOVA Analyses Experiment 1Download CSVDisplay Table Table 4 TABLE A4 Main Effects for ANOVA on All Participants in Experiment 2: Same-Sex MarriageDownload CSVDisplay Table Table 5 TABLE A5 Disaggregated ANOVA Analyses Experiment 2Download CSVDisplay TableMOCK ARTICLE WITH MANIPULATIONS—EXPERIMENT 1Minneapolis (AP) –The controversy surrounding gun violence has escalated and a recent development has judges playing an increasingly important role. More cases involving the issue are being filed in the legal system raising concerns about judicial impartiality and the impact of law on public policy.Basis of Decision ManipulationsBribe—In one particularly high profile case authorities discovered that Steven Santos, a County Court judge in Minnesota accepted a substantial bribe from Lucky Sevens Gun Corporation, a party interested in the outcome of a case he decided.Politics—In one particularly high profile case Steven Santos, a County Court judge in Minnesota, admitted in a speech yesterday that he decided a case involving the liability of handgun manufacturers the way he did because of his political beliefsLaw—In one particularly high profile case Steven Santos, a County Court judge in Minnesota, said in a speech yesterday that he decided a case involving the liability of handgun manufacturers the way he did based on his legal interpretation of the ConstitutionThe case, Abbrara v. Lucky Sevens Gun Corporation, concerned whether victims of accidental shootings could recover from handgun manufacturers for design defects. Judge Santos ruled that a state statute allowing for such lawsuits was unconstitutional.Frame ManipulationsThematic—As a result victims and their families across the state were notified they would not be able to sue handgun manufacturers for incidents that may have resulted in injuries or the death of a loved one.Episodic—As a result, Joseph Abbrara was notified he would not be able to sue Lucky Sevens Corporation for the death of his sixteen-year-old son in an incident that occurred last March.Public Support ManipulationsMajority Support—According to a recent public opinion poll, a majority of citizens in Minnesota believe that gun manufacturers should not be legally responsible. In line with Judge Santos' decision, 85 percent of the public supports the idea that gun manufacturers should not be legally responsible for product design defects that result in accidental injuries or death.Majority Opposition—According to a recent public opinion poll, a majority of citizens in Minnesota believe that gun manufacturers should be legally responsible. Contrary to Judge Santos' decision, 85 percent of the public supports the idea that gun manufacturers should be legally responsible for product design defects that result in accidental injuries or death.The issue of gun manufacturer liability is sure to continue to be litigated in the courts. The behavior of Judge Santos could have long standing implications for citizens' confidence in the legal system to deal with such controversial issues.MOCK ARTICLE WITH MANIPULATIONS EXPERIMENT 2Minneapolis (AP) – The controversy surrounding same-sex marriage has escalated and a recent development has judges playing an increasingly important role. More cases involving the issue are being filed in the legal system raising concerns about judicial impartiality and the impact of law on public policy.Basis of Decision ManipulationsContribution (where statute upheld)—In one particularly high profile case authorities discovered that Steven Santos, a County Court judge in Minnesota, accepted a substantial political contribution from Protect Marriage Minnesota, a group interested in the outcome of a case he decided.Contribution (where statute struck down)—In one particularly high profile case authorities discovered that Steven Santos, a County Court judge in Minnesota, accepted a substantial political contribution from Equality Marriage Minnesota, a group interested in the outcome of a case he decided.Political—In one particularly high profile case Steven Santos, a County Court judge in Minnesota, admitted in a speech yesterday that he decided a case involving same-sex marriage the way he did because of his political beliefs.Legal—In one particularly high profile case Steven Santos, a County Court judge in Minnesota, said in a speech yesterday that he decided a case involving same-sex marriage the way he did based on his legal interpretation of the Constitution.The case, Abbrara v. Minnesota, concerned whether an individual could marry a person of the same sex.Ruling ManipulationsUpholding Restrictions—Judge Santos ruled that a state law restricting marriage to unions "between a man and a woman" was permissible under the Constitution. As a result, Joseph Abbrara was notified that he could not marry Stanley Hickman, his partner of 12 years.Striking down Restrictions—Judge Santos ruled that a state law restricting marriage to unions "between a man and a woman" was unconstitutional. As a result, Joseph Abbrara was notified that he could marry Stanley Hickman, his partner of 12 years.Majority Support Manipulations(where upheld) According to a recent public opinion poll, a majority of citizens in Minnesota do not believe that same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. In line with Judge Santos' decision, 85 percent of the public supports the idea that marriage should be between a man and a woman.(where struck down) According to a recent public opinion poll, a majority of citizens in Minnesota believe that same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. In line with Judge Santos' decision, 85 percent of the public supports the idea that individuals should be allowed to marry a person of the same-sex.The issue of same-sex marriage is sure to continue to be litigated in the courts. The behavior of Judge Santos could have long standing implications for citizens' confidence in the legal system to deal with such controversial issues.Question WordingPolicy Questions (before article with several other policy questions)Gun RegulationsSome people believe guns are inherently dangerous weapons that should be regulated more strictly by the government, others believe that individuals are ultimately responsible for their won behavior and such regulations infringe on personal freedom. To what extent do you agree with the following question?Guns should be strictly regulated by the government.1–strongly disagree2–somewhat disagree3–slightly disagree4–slightly agree5–somewhat agree6–strongly agreeSame-Sex MarriageSome people believe that gays and lesbians should be allowed to marry so they are treated as equal members of society, others think that marriage should only be between a man and a women. To what extent do you agree with the following statement?Gays and lesbians should be allowed to legally marry.1–strongly disagree2–somewhat disagree3–slightly disagree4–slightly agree5–somewhat agree6–strongly agreeMeasures (after article)Neutrality—Based on your reading of the article do you believe Judge Santos was neutral and objective in considering the law and arguments in the case about (gun liability)?YesDon't knowNoHow much do you agree with the following statements?(all measured on same scale)1–strongly disagree2–somewhat disagree3–slightly disagree4–slightly agree5–somewhat agree6–strongly agreeFairness—Gun LiabilityThe plaintiffs described in the article seeking to sue the gun manufacturer were treated fairlyThe defendant gun manufacturer was treated fairlyFairness—Same-Sex MarriageThe plaintiffs described in the article seeking a marriage license were treated fairlyThe defendant, State of Minnesota was treated fairlyLegitimacy—Judge Santos' behavior in this case represents a legitimate (or appropriate) exercise of judicial authority.NotesBraman (Citation2009) has also used this framework to explain the influence of policy preferences in legal decision-making. She argues that because judges have a chronic awareness of the role decisional norms play in legitimizing their choices, accuracy goals are foremost in their awareness when making decisions. Yet directional goals can (and do) play a role in seemingly objective legal judgments—especially where the law is ambiguous or unclear. Braman also demonstrates, however, that the influence of directional goals is not without limits; where the law is sufficiently clear, the role of directional goals is greatly diminished for accuracy-seeking decision makers.In contrast to our conceptualization, normative legal scholars tend to see legitimacy as a dichotomous term; a specific decision is legitimate (or it is not) based on how legal decision makers go about making that judgment. Where judges use appropriate legal criteria in their decisions, the exercise of authority is deemed legitimate; where extralegal considerations (such as politics or self-interest) come into play, it is not. While we agree that this characterization of normative legitimacy is extremely useful for theoretical purposes (indeed, we use it in setting up our argument above), we think that in investigating lay perceptions of court decisions, our continuum approach is more appropriate.Although our theory posits that public suppport may be taken as some evidence of legitmacy where normative cues are unclear, it is not the "most appropriate" criteria for evaluation due to the contermajoritarian role judges play as protectors of minority rights in our system.Bybee (Citation2010), for instance, notes that citizens understand judges are ideologically motivated at the same time researchers such as Gibson and Caldeira (Citation2009) find they hold courts in high esteem. This could reflect the fact that people see decisions motivated by ideology as just as appropriate as decisions motivated by legal considerations in our politicized legal system, or perhaps citizens are unwilling to devalue entire institutions based on generalized accusations of improper behavior on behalf of individual judges in particular cases. Looking at how individuals assess the exercise of judicial authority in particular instances where decisional motivations are explicit will help us understand the role of normative considerations in their evaluations.In these conditions the judge explicitly admitted to political motives in his decision-making. We purposefully chose this scenario so there would be no ambiguity about the role of ideology in his judgment to allow for a clear comparison with other motivations. We discuss the implications of this particular operationalization on our experimental findings further in the discussion section.Participants were evenly split on the gun control question with 54 percent of participants expressing support for gun control measures and 51 percent of participants expressing opposition for gun control measures. The wording for the gun control question is provided in the Appendix.For all the research on legitimacy, researchers have been loath to ask court observers directly whether or not they see specific court outputs as "legitimate." We are not entirely sure why this is the case; we think it could be an unfortunate result of path dependence in studies of perceptions of court outputs. In very early work, Gibson expressed some reservations about whether or not citizens could understand the term "legitimacy" as applied to judicial institutions (Gibson Citation1989). Here we use the term in our measure, theorizing participants will be able to apply the concept to particular case decisions, but we also clarify its meaning to encompass the concept of appropriateness.To our knowledge, this particular distinction between episodic and thematic framing has been used mostly in studies of media reports and attributions for problems such as poverty and welfare (Iyengar Citation1996; Gross Citation2008; Aaroe Citation2011; Gilens Citation1999). We believe the logic, however, extends quite directly to the framing of case consequences.One concern that people may have with our experimental approach is our utilization of undergraduates as participants in the study. We note other judicial scholars have used undergraduate samples in experiments looking at public assessments of court decisions (e.g., Zink et al. Citation2009; Ramirez Citation2008). Of course, there are those who question the generalizability of findings from experiments using undergraduate samples; college students are unquestionably younger and more educated, on average, than the general population (Sears Citation1986). But findings are no less "real" because they pertain to undergraduate judgments about legitimacy. Concerns about external validity are strongest where there is some reason to think that differences between experimental populations and the general public would cause the judgments and cognitive processes investigators are looking at to be different (Druckman and Kam 2011). Here there is not much theoretical reason to expect that differences between participants and the general population would cause them to think differently about court outputs. While it is true that the distribution of policy preferences on the issues that are the subject of articles in our study—gun control and same-sex marriage—is likely different among students, we are less interested in generalizing about judgments made with regard to these issues, per se, than the processes involved in making legitimacy assessments.See Table A1 in Appendix for demographic breakdown of undergraduate participants.Quite generally, effect size relates to the proportion of variance each individual variable or interaction explains in our analyses. Indeed, by this measure, the influence of decisional grounds was the strongest of all variables included in the analysis.All significance tests were estimated with Bonferroni tests. Bonferroni tests are appropriate where there are three or more conditions. Figure 1 Main Effect for Basis of Decision, Experiment 1—Tort Liability. Values represent participants' level of agreement with the following statement: Judge Santos' behavior in this case represents a legitimate (or appropriate) exercise of judicial authority utilizing the following scale: (1–strongly disagree, 2–disagree, 3–slightly disagree, 4–slightly agree, 5–agree, 6–strongly agree). *Legal decisions are rated significantly higher (p <.05) than bribes or politically motivated decisions.Display full size There is also a significant interaction between public support and framing in this category of cases (F(1,35) = 5.28, p <.03) that we must further explore to fully understand the substantive importance of the variable with regard to politically motivated decisions. We undertake that task in the next section regarding our "framing" hypotheses. Figure 2 Main Effects for Public Opinion; Experiment 1—Disaggregated Analyses. Values represent participants' level of agreement with the following statement: Judge Santos' behavior in this case represents a legitimate (or appropriate) exercise of judicial authority utilizing the following scale: (1–strongly disagree, 2–disagree, 3–slightly disagree, 4–slightly agree, 5–agree, 6–strongly agree). +Public opinion is marginally significant (p <.10) where decision is politically motivated. *Public opinion is significant (p <.05) where decision is legally motivated.Display full size Where participants were told that the judge ruled that the law was valid, we operationalized conditions that said public opinion was substantially against same-sex marriage as characterizing majority support for the decision. Where the article stated the judge found the law unconstitutional, substantial support for same-sex marriage was coded as majority support.In our sample, 78 percent of participants expressed support for same-sex marriage, and 28 percent of participants expressed opposition to same-sex marriage. We used the midpoint split to create a factor in our experimental analysis, noting that for groups of unequal size, differences need to be quite large to achieve statistical significance providing a difficult test of our experimental hypotheses.The experiment was conducted in February 2012, well before the recent uproar over gun violence as a result of school shootings in Connecticut that occurred in December of that year.